The Lab Notebook

Non-lucid dream, [Commentary made while awake]

Night of April 22-23

I have returned to Japan to live there again. I live in an apartment that is in the same city and the same neighborhood as the one I lived in the first time, but it's several times as big, and has a separate kitchen as well as a larger bathroom.

I'm outside of the building, on the north side of it, standing on a large, open, elevated concrete plaza. [It kind of resembled the one that's part of the queue for Space Mountain at Disneyland, now that I think of it, only bigger. It definitely doesn't exist in real life, at least, not there.] I admire the view of the nearby hills and the old houses that are on top of them. [Um, what?] There is a tourist there with me, pointing a camera to the south at the big apartment building behind me. I tell him that he's at one of the three or four most popular places in the city to take pictures. [What. There are an awful lot more than three or four such places in my city, and that certainly isn't one of them.]

I have a conversation with someone in Japanese, and I seem to handle it fairly well. The words come quite easily. [And I don't remember any of them being off or weird, as they sometimes have been in previous dreams.] Nevertheless, I feel concerned about my Japanese language abilities no longer being adequate to deal with the day-to-day tasks of living here, especially not now that I'm fully responsible for dealing with all the transaction details for things like bills and rent. [This is currently of my ongoing background thoughts in real life, too, but one I haven't been able to give much conscious thought to. Obviously.] I take out my foreign resident registration card, look at it, and think, This is the one from last time, so it's expired now, but it'll be good until I can get an updated one. [Um, no. It doesn't work that way. I don't have the one from last time anymore in real life; I handed it in upon leaving Japan to return to the U.S., which is required.]

Night of April 23-24

My mom and I are driving through a wild area in the brown car. We're looking for an outdoor wedding ceremony that someone told us we should attend. We drive along, and I spot the ceremony: it's taking place on the opposite side of the river from where our car is. We drive along the river for a ways, looking for a place where we can cross it and turn around.

[Different scene.] My mom and I are shopping in the shopping center nearest our house [the one we often walk through in reality]. We're in a smallish, narrowish store that sells beauty products. We leave it and walk along the walkway that passes in front of all the shops, heading back home on foot. There is a man there who only has the upper half of one leg left, and who gets around on crutches. There is also a woman in an electric mobility vehicle there. She's wearing a T-shirt [I think; or it might have been a sign] with text on it that says that she's from a very large family, and that her mother started having children when she was only 11 [!!]. I get into a very long, involved conversation with this woman. [I don't remember most of it now, but I do remember that] One of the topics of conversation is how different our points of view and perspectives are because of the different experiences we've had. At one point, I say, “And I don't care about kids, unless they're my students.” She replies, “You see? Different perspectives.” We walk all the way to the end of the shopping center and turn up the road that leads back to my house.